Make Your Home Among Strangers

Lizet visits a chemistry tutor on campus and makes appointments to study biology and calculus for the rest of the semester. On her way to the writing center to see a tutor about an upcoming English paper, she catches a news report on Ariel Hernandez. She changes the volume to remove the closed-captioning on the TV, so this image of her Mami’s neighborhood will be more peaceful.

Turning away from the TVs, Lizet runs into Jaquelin, who hugs her and invites her to a party that weekend at a mansion off campus. Lizet decides to go, realizing the favor she was doing for Jaquelin, “I got what she meant […] she didn’t feel like going to a party where she might be the only person of color” (109). Lizet realizes as she is getting ready for the party that weekend that she has no interest in catering to the snooty white girls on her floor. Still, she is upset when the white girls leave without telling her, despite having invited her to walk to the same party with them. 

Lizet gets to the party an hour late, and Jaquelin is already inside somewhere. Music is blaring, and Lizet walks into the foyer, discarding her jacket and maneuvering past nervous white girls who are sipping bad beer, too nervous to go inside. Lizet feels in her element for a change; she strides in with confidence, thinking “This is how you enter a club, motherfuckers” (117). Before she makes it inside, however, she is interrupted by Ethan, whom she tries to get rid of by telling him that she has a boyfriend.

Jillian interrupts, sloppy drunk and sweating. Ethan flirts with Lizet, inviting her to an ice skating event the next day. After he leaves, Lizet finds Jaquelin inside, and the two dance together. Lizet is amazed at how badly everyone in the room dances, including Jillian. Lizet is pulled up on stage by the DJ, who gets handsy, though Lizet pretends not to notice. 

After the party, Lizet leaves Jillian passed out in their dorm room so she can study before going ice skating with Ethan. About 10 freshmen join them, and as they walk through campus, Ethan shares bits of information and history that Lizet finds fascinating. She admires Ethan’s knowledge, and his love of sharing it with the world.

Lizet struggles with ice skating, mostly clinging to the side of the rink, and ultimately gives up when she falls hard for the third time. Ethan joins her on the bench after the fall, and they talk. He asks if she would ever want to be an RA, explaining the monetary perks. Lizet is shocked: “Not one conversation about money existed for me outside the financial aid office […] that’s how little anyone at Rawlings seemed to think about how much anything cost” (131). Lizet becomes self-conscious, thinking she comes off as poor, and their chat comes to an awkward end.

Lizet is then swept up in finals week, stopping only once to call her father after many months without hearing from him. She vows to make him answer for selling their family home when she goes back to Miami for Christmas. 

Mami is enthusiastic when she meets Lizet at the airport, but something seems off. As they rush back to the car to avoid paying extra for parking, Lizet thinks about how she is seeing her mother through the lens of her peers back at Rawlings: “I saw her as a tacky-looking woman, as the Cuban lady the girls on my floor would’ve seen, alone in an airport” (139). On the drive home Mami asks questions without waiting for answers, avoiding the subject of school itself.

Leidy is waiting for them at home, and it looks as if the apartment has been freshly cleaned. A congratulatory bear and balloon are on the table, but before Lizet can thank her mother, Mami disappears into her bedroom and shuts the door. Leidy is convinced that Lizet is freaking their mother out; Lizet is confused, but feels too exhausted from finals and the flight to push the subject.